Ashe was his woman, and she had more compassion in her little finger than he did in his entire body. Of course, she was going to rally, no matter how exhausted she was. “If I start to fall asleep at the table, just pinch me or something.”
He grinned at her wickedly. “I’ll make the evening very exciting for you if you like.”
“Don’t you dare do anything to rouse my leopard, or me, for that matter. I’m going to admit to you, I’m very sore. I don’t know how Evangeline or other women do this. Having sex is becoming painful.”
“Fucking barbs,” he said under his breath, but he meant it. It wasn’t like they were there all the time. Not on him, anyway. During a heat, he had them and knew his counterpart, Temnyy, had them as well. The more aroused Timur was, the more hormones Ashe had, the more the barbs were triggered.
Most of the time, their women would barely, if at all, feel pain when they withdrew, but for some reason, Ashe’s wealth of hormones triggered the animal in him every time. All the bath salts in the world weren’t going to help.
“You know she’s going to rise again soon, don’t you?”
She nodded and took the hand he held out to her. “I know. It’s all right. I’ll be so hot for you I won’t feel anything but good. You always make it amazing for me.”
“And then after, you’re so tired you can’t move.”
She flashed her mischievous grin, the one that made him as hard as a rock. “Gets me out of all the cooking and household chores.”
He’d been doing both and happily. He found himself smiling at her for no reason other than she was the best thing that had ever happened to him. They walked through the moonlight to the main house, hand in hand again. He had placed his leopards close to the house and also at the outermost positions just in case Evangeline’s family was part of a larger conspiracy. Sadly, he was fairly certain that was the case.
His human soldiers were patrolling through the middle sections. They were good men, loyal to Fyodor. Fyodor took care of his soldiers, having been one for many years. They made good money and were given all kinds of extra perks. It was the new age of criminal, with health benefits and retirement built in.
“You have a frown on your face.”
He forced himself to smile at her, when he wanted to shred Evangeline’s family. One, or more of them, had betrayed her. Ulisse Mancini was hungry for more territory and power. The other crime bosses had cut him off at the knees, but he still found a way around them. He used Emilio Bassini’s international pipeline to move his counterfeit money with Emilio’s weapons. Now, Timur knew, that wasn’t the only thing moved. He trafficked young girls, sending them to Russia, to Lazar. Lazar distributed the girls throughout Europe and sent Ulisse European girls.
One or more of Evangeline’s family was in Ulisse’s pay. It was the only answer. The one member who had been, for certain, given a tour of the house was her brother Ambroise. That didn’t condemn him entirely. Her father and uncle had been to the house as well.
“I’m not a dinner party kind of man, Ashe. I never will be.”
Her fingers tightened in his. “Don’t worry, honey. I’m good at this kind of thing. I just chat about nothing. It works every time. I’ll get you through it.”
He believed she could get away with chatting about nothing. Her voice was melodic and anyone listening would want to hear more. She was cute, adorable and gorgeous. He kissed her fingers and then pulled open the door to the kitchen. He’d chosen to enter the house that way in order to make certain his security force was standing by. He wanted them at every door. He wanted patrols through the house checking windows. He wanted to know every time a guest visited a restroom exactly how much time it took and if they deviated from their destination to look into other rooms. After they were seated back at the table, the rooms they’d been in had to be searched for bugs and to ensure nothing had been left open to allow a hit man to get inside.
He nodded to young Jeremiah, the bane of his life. Of course, Gorya would put him in the kitchen where he could make the least mistakes. With his hand on Ashe’s back, he moved through the large room quickly to get to the dining room. The table was set for eight, Evangeline’s four family members, and Fyodor, Evangeline, Ashe and him. He had made certain to tell Fyodor to put him across from her family.
Evangeline had done so. He could see the little name tags above each place setting. She’d used the more formal china, the set he knew she never used. His heart contracted. She was making the dinner as nice as she could for her family. She wanted things to work out between them. If it was possible, he wanted to make certain she never knew that one of them had betrayed her.